The Neolithic in Mediterranean Europe
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The Neolithic in Mediterranean Europe Malone, C. (2015). The Neolithic in Mediterranean Europe. In J. Harding, C. Fowler, & D. Hofmann (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Neolithic Europe (Oxford Handbooks in Archaeology). Oxford University Press. http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199545841.do Published in: The Oxford Handbook of Neolithic Europe Document Version: Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Queen's University Belfast - Research Portal: Link to publication record in Queen's University Belfast Research Portal Publisher rights © 2015 Oxford University Press. 'The Neolithic in Mediterranean Europe, Caroline Malone' in The Oxford Handbook of Neolithic Europe by/edited by Chris Fowler, Jan Harding, and Daniela Hofmann, 2015, reproduced by permission of Oxford University Press https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-oxford-handbook-of-neolithic-europe-9780199545841?cc=gb&lang=en&# General rights Copyright for the publications made accessible via the Queen's University Belfast Research Portal is retained by the author(s) and / or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing these publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. Take down policy The Research Portal is Queen's institutional repository that provides access to Queen's research output. Every effort has been made to ensure that content in the Research Portal does not infringe any person's rights, or applicable UK laws. If you discover content in the Research Portal that you believe breaches copyright or violates any law, please contact [email protected]. Download date:28. Sep. 2021 The Neolithic in Mediterranean Europe Oxford Handbooks Online The Neolithic in Mediterranean Europe Caroline Malone The Oxford Handbook of Neolithic Europe (Forthcoming) Edited by Chris Fowler, Jan Harding, and Daniela Hofmann Subject: Archaeology, Archaeology of Europe Online Publication Date: Jul DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199545841.013.069 2014 Abstract and Keywords The Mediterranean region represented a significant zone for the transmission of the Neolithic and its farming economy. This essay reviews the different mechanisms and geographic constraints that influenced the movement of farming and cultural trends, and assesses the current interpretative models as well as traditional approaches in the context of recent archaeological discoveries and publication. Neolithic evidence across southern Europe, from the Near East, Aegean, north Africa and to Iberia and France, is described in the different regions and set against the current chronology. Key issues include the parallel development of settled farmers alongside mobile hunter-gatherers and their gradual assimilation into food producing societies, and the longevity of the typical Mediterranean economy. Keywords: Mediterranean, Neolithic, colonization, islands, Anatolia, population, Wave of Advance model, farming, origins, domestication, pottery Introduction: the Mediterranean as a melting pot The Mediterranean provided the primary conduit for the movement of domestic plants and animals from the Near East to other landmasses and islands. The linkage between the pristine zone (Minnis 1985) of south-west Asian domestication and Neolithization in the Levant and Europe was modelled to a large extent on the nature of the Mediterranean ‘lake’ that was bordered by three continents. This juxtaposition of lacustrine-bordered landmasses doubtless influenced the nature of agricultural spread and adoption over a rapidly expanding area between c. 10 000 and 6000 years ago and the cultures that emerged from this process. The Mediterranean sea is c. 2 505 000 km2 in surface area, measures c. 4000 km east to west and c. 800 km north to south, and is enclosed by an indented coastline of enormous length between Asia, Africa, and Europe. It contains at least 1000 habitable islands, the largest of which, Sicily and Sardinia, cover some 25 000 km2 each, and the island archipelagos provide ‘stepping stones’ for the dispersal of cultural and economic materials, ideas, and settlement. From later Palaeolithic times, larger islands adjacent to landmasses were exploited, enabled by low sea levels or the use of early sea craft. The basin of the Mediterranean is surrounded by upland massifs and rugged mountain chains (Atlas, Taurus, Pindos, Apennines, Alps, Pyrenees), some of which form the distinctive peninsulas dividing the basin into separate zones (Iberia, Italy, Balkans, Anatolia). Little of the region is classified as lowland, and coastal plains are mostly narrow and restricted, offering relatively limited landscape suitable for early Neolithic farming. The upland landscape, drained by river valleys with steep gorges and torrents and short, wide, and shallow ‘wadis’, often causes floods and catastrophic erosion once cleared of vegetation. The climate around the Mediterranean fringes is similar to the Levant, with hot dry summers and mild but often wet winters. Inland climates differ far more, especially in upland zones, with marked seasonal conditions and cool winters. Even coastal north Africa claims a Mediterranean climate. Whilst the domesticated plants and animals of south-west Asia were adapted to dryer, hotter conditions, the coastal environment of much of the Mediterranean might not have demanded much additional change. The hinterlands with their colder, wetter seasons, salty alluvial zones, and forested landscapes posed a far greater challenge, and the use of barley, sheep/goat, and upland pulses implies local modification and adaptation. The contemporary Mediterranean landscape is changed out of all recognition. Forest clearance since the Neolithic, Roman exploitation of hillsides for commercial production of vines, olives, and cereals, historic overexploitation, and overpopulation have all contributed to soil erosion, changed ground water levels, and badlands. The classic Mediterranean landscape of peasant agricultural exploitation, portrayed by Braudel (1972; see also Barker 1995), was probably far less productive by the 16th century AD than at the beginning of the Neolithic, but many features, such as unstable soils, floods, and drought remain unchanged. Such conditions have perpetuated the seasonal use of different parts of the landscape for transhumance and upland stock farming, and lowland cereal production and settlement. Scholarly background The Neolithic has been the focus of scholarly study for barely a century in most parts of the Mediterranean, but landscape approaches since the Second World War, along with aerial photography, survey, soil and environmental study, and a very Mediterranean tradition of culture-sequence research, have revealed most of the regional Neolithic cultures. Some areas (such as the Aegean) have been popular for research, whilst others, such as north Africa, have been largely ignored. Dating programmes since the 1960s have revolutionized our understanding of the antiquity of the Neolithic, resulting in the ‘Wave of Advance’ model (Ammerman and Cavalli Sforza 1971; 1973; 1984) combining evidence of genetic, linguistic, and cultural movement with an improving chronological framework. Current interests are diverse, including environmental and material approaches, alongside ‘post-processual’ studies exemplified by projects such as Çatal Höyük in central Anatolia (Hodder 1996; 2000) and phenomenological investigations (Skeates 2008; Tilley 2004; 2008). A lack of interpretative syntheses of Neolithic archaeology, however, hinders a detailed understanding of much of the region. It is still rare to find fieldwork programmes addressing the Neolithic as a primary research goal, and few sites are examined within their wider economic landscapes, or subject to soil and seed, isotopic, population, dating, or environmental analyses. To compensate, explanatory models and simulation studies address key issues of Page 1 of 10 PRINTED FROM OXFORD HANDBOOKS ONLINE (www.oxfordhandbooks.com). (c) Oxford University Press, 2014. All Rights Reserved. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a PDF of a single chapter of a title in Oxford Handbooks Online for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy). Subscriber: Oxford University Press - Master Gratis Access; date: 07 October 2014 The Neolithic in Mediterranean Europe how agricultural society spread across the region. Mesolithic background and Neolithization Despite the often insubstantial evidence for mobile hunter-gatherer groups, the Mediterranean basin and its hinterland provided rich and varied foraging landscapes—and most if not all the landscapes and at least the larger islands were probably known, exploited, and populated to some degree long before agriculture emerged. Mobility involved terrestrial, maritime, and riverine exploitation by Mesolithic communities capable of navigation, boat-raft building, and with a wide knowledge of their land and seascapes. Given this, the questions to ask are why and how economic strategies changed, and why some communities accepted novelty and innovation, whilst others remained conservative. Changing environmental conditions almost certainly triggered change and innovation across the Near Eastern Levant (defined here as Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Israel). The early Holocene (c. 10 000–6000 BC) saw remarkable ecological regeneration after the dry cold of the late Pleistocene in south- west Asian and Mediterranean landscapes (Roberts 1998; Moore 1983; Moore et al. 2000). Subsistence in the particular ecozones of the Levant,